- Crowdsourcing translations, that's just terrible and a sign that Beamdog is either understaffed, doesn't have money or set up an unrealistic deadline

I can only speak for Russian, but there was about 1% of quality translations of the official total, last time I was checking. Community-made translation is often better for IE games.

- Nerd pandering (sexy elf mages)

Tired to repeat, but an elf has a longer lifespan and therefore can accumulate some experience yet look young still. Not everybody makes such a shining career as PC does in BG.Spellcasters stand behind the line and don't get scarred, thus looking not just young, but pretty too.

- Not actually improving the graphics aside from the resolution fix. Blurring the edges is not an improvement

Not that I care, but agree, more or less.

- They don't even try to fit the new content into the game. A IWD-style separate dungeon? Come on.

Agreed here.

- 20$ for a 15 year old game. Even when Square Enix does that, they at least make a proper remake.

Don't buy then?

- Their naive expectations about 500k sold copies on iPads

Which means..?

Which is fairly silly. I played BG1 when I was either 10 or 11 when it first came out. Nothing really even warrants PG13.

I don't usually post in this thread because I don't have strong feelings one way or the other about BGEE, but.

- Nerd pandering (sexy elf mages)

Tired to repeat, but an elf has a longer lifespan and therefore can accumulate some experience yet look young still. Not everybody makes such a shining career as PC does in BG.Spellcasters stand behind the line and don't get scarred, thus looking not just young, but pretty too.

I have nothing against Neera just yet since I like mages, but really, I'm not thrilled with an explanation that implies that a woman is only noteworthy and worth a romance if she looks young and pretty. Never mind that a 25 year old human can have racked up a ton of experience also, NPCs shouldn't really have much experience at all in BG1 anyway, and as many female players might enjoy young, handsome, elvish options as well.

I'm not going to! But you can bet I'm going to criticize them for it, because it's a shitty thing to do.

Tired to repeat, but an elf has a longer lifespan and therefore can accumulate some experience yet look young still. Not everybody makes such a shining career as PC does in BG.Spellcasters stand behind the line and don't get scarred, thus looking not just young, but pretty too.

Wait, what are you trying to say? That a character has to be young and pretty? I don't follow

I can only speak for Russian, but there was about 1% of quality translations of the official total, last time I was checking. Community-made translation is often better for IE games.

Yeah, those people who spend few minutes a day lousily translating a game sure can do it better than people who literally do it 8 hours a day as their job.

i had to step away from BG for a bout six months, but am itching to get back in now. i've read that eventually they plan on releasing a linux version of EE. any there an specifics of how they plan to release and sell the game? I guess at this point i'm debating whether to wait for the linux version, install a dual boot of xp just for EE, or just play BGT.

I was going to make a nasty comment that a 15yo should not be playing BG in the first place

Hey! That was rather offensive!

Anyway, might I add one more reason why BGEE's going to fail? Well, simply that they refused to sell the game on what would be argubaly be the best site to sell it on (GOG.com) - I mean, the origional version of BG sold like hotcakes, and Atari (the publisher of BGEE) aleady has a good deal with CD Projekt, the owners of the site (and creators of the excellent Witcher games). Also, not using CD Projekt's translation for the Polish version of the game, which is really really bad.

Edited by William Imm, 02 September 2012 - 09:27 AM.

At this point, I'm not really doing much Baldur's Gate related. More focused on Skyrim modding and the Born of Legend tabletop roleplaying game. Don't expect much activity here.

Almateria, I am not attacking you, and I don't want to come off like a jerk, but you hit a sore spot I can't stop yelling about in my head, so I am going to rant a bit. Because that always helps things, you know, when an idiot like me comes along and just splashes walls of text in a vain attempt to pursuade the wind to change it's course...

[RANT BEGINS]
While I disagree that BG:EE is really "monetizing mods", I will bite on the "Monetizing free mods" comment -

So far, no one has monetized any mods. They are all still available for free on the original engines they were designed for. So on that front, everyone should be happy. In fact, they *have not included mods without getting permission from all stakeholders*, which is actually darned nice of them, since modding a copyrighted game is technically ILLEGAL. Fanfic, mod, etc., we all forget that while modern games have different licenses and allow mods to go ahead and play about without regard to copyright issues. When BG was written, it was buttoned up under copyright. So hacking the .exe was a copyright violation. The IESDP, a true illegal hacker reference manual. All mods that use or touch existing game resources and change them in any way are violations of WotSC, Atari, Black Isle, BioWare, and now BeamDog/Overhaul as well. Even completely original ones - if they use the source assets, just *putting them into the game* is an unauthorized (get that - un - author - ized = using without permission = stealing) use and a copyright infringement.

Try pubishing a version of Harry Potter, where muggles double as psionicists, and see how fast J.K Rowling sues you into oblivion. Jane Austen can have vampires, because the books are out of copyright - or because the owner of the copyright has given permission and probably has gotten cash.

We as a community have always pushed hard to make sure people get the original games and we are careful not to get paid for work so that no one who actually owns the copyright has any cause to start sending out the "remove this content from the internet or we will sue you for copyright infringement". (Unlike the thousands of YouTube videos that get slammed out of existence every day because someone has put a ripped soundtrack behind them). We stomp on folks who talk about torrents, as that means the game has not been purchased. We build mods that *must* have original game resources installed to work, instead of just shipping an .exe - even when what is happening is Ascension64's ToBEX is actually rebuilding the .exe in memory. Basically, when it comes right down to it, we are squatters. We moved into the abandoned property, fixed it up a bit, added or touches, all while making sure it was in the actual *owners* interests to ignore the fact that we were breaking the terms of the "lease" just by walking in the front door - let alone fixing it and adding a third story and cutting in a new side door or two. We have not paid the owners, ever, any cash, and we hold no legal rights to stay here.

So, I'll step up and say monetizing mods is evil, twisted, narcissitic, stupid, and horrible theft of intellectual property when done by a modder.

But now we have a new landlord. Really, a management company, since the property is owned by the original owners, and BeamDog/Overhaul got the rights to manage the property, but not full ownership. They still have to approve almost everything with the original owners.

And it is good, solid, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, and reverent when a company offers to play nicely with the folks who love the game enough to add content, allowing us to continue to mod without fear of lawyers. They *purchased* limited rights to the game. They *have to make money* to feed themselves. All the talk about what they can't do because of contracts is because the content is under copyright, and to use it, someone has to

1. approve it's use within the intellectual property rules
2. agree to it's distribution
3 get money for said uses and distribution

So, instead of saying "ok, modders, time to close up your squatters tents on our property and move along, and if we see anything even resembling a mod coming along we will sue you and block the content. Oh, by the way, we like what you have done for the place. Now, all of it belongs to us. Drop what you are holding while the local sherrif kindly escorts you off of my property."

They said

"Hey. We respect your work. We want you to stick around and help fix up the property, and we will help you make it better. We won't use your stuff unless we can figure out who did the work and get their permission, and we will even let you keep modding the other platforms - we are not going to restrict your code usage to our property, you get to keep working on the original properties just like you are now. Keep doing what you are doing, and wth the new management, these new condos are going to let you do it better. We see this as a win-win partnership instead of a winner-takes-all deal."

(Sorry. Long rant. I know it is tough to swallow, but intellectual property rights and copyright issues see to escape modern thinking. It drives me nuts. This stuff is not open-sourced. Somebody actually owns it. Just adding things into the game without getting now 4 different companies to ok it is straightforward copyright infringement. I love modding, but I remain aware that it is messing with someone else's property without their permission. I justify it as volunteering to add value to the property. )

Eh... on the other hand, I wouldn't put it in quite so strong black and white terms as that, cmorgan. To the best of my knowledge, there's no definitive answer on whether or not any of this fits under the fair use defense. Modding is obviously a lot more problematic than straight fanfiction (which I do believe would be protected if it ever went to a court), what with the actual software hacking involved, but especially for those of us who don't demand monetary compensation, there are some pretty strong fair use arguments. Really, I personally think a moral rights argument against modding would maybe be harder to beat than a copyright one, but that's mostly a Euro thing and I doubt the Lanham Act would quite apply to this situation anyway.

I have nothing against Neera just yet since I like mages, but really, I'm not thrilled with an explanation that implies that a woman is only noteworthy and worth a romance if she looks young and pretty. Never mind that a 25 year old human can have racked up a ton of experience also, NPCs shouldn't really have much experience at all in BG1 anyway, and as many female players might enjoy young, handsome, elvish options as well.

As far as looks go, I would surely pick young and pretty over an old and ugly. And I suspect I'm not alone in my preference, among both genders. And since we play a game, I see little reason to not draw the first image.

Character-wise, I think the only NPC I really liked was Kaelyn in NWN2 MotB. The lack of romance option was probably only a bonus to that rather than a penalty. But I think nobody expects to find such jewels in every game and addon, so I'd settle for the next best option - a female elf mage.

Good point about little XP in BG1, though, I haven't thought about it.

Yeah, those people who spend few minutes a day lousily translating a game sure can do it better than people who literally do it 8 hours a day as their job.

"People who literally do it 8 hours a day as their job" are doing their job badly and non-professionally. In Russia, at least. Not just games, btw, but books and movies too - I've seen enough examples to call it a tendency.

So what, you like the idea of paying for mods? Mods that you have no right to charge for?

I like the idea of BGEE coming with pre-installed BG2Fixpack, ToBEx and 1PP. It makes life much easier for a modder. You have no idea how troublesome it can be to deal with players who mangle their install order and come with bizarre bug reports.

Besides, they did have received permission to charge for said mods - http://www.shsforums...oad-discussion/I find it ridiculous when people come counting money in somebody else's pocket. Are they charging money for your mods? I'm inclined to think that no, so what's your problem then? Or are you Vlad in disguise? Or just plain jealousy for not being accepted into the elite club?

So far, no one has monetized any mods. They are all still available for free on the original engines they were designed for. So on that front, everyone should be happy. In fact, they *have not included mods without getting permission from all stakeholders*, which is actually darned nice of them, since modding a copyrighted game is technically ILLEGAL. Fanfic, mod, etc., we all forget that while modern games have different licenses and allow mods to go ahead and play about without regard to copyright issues. When BG was written, it was buttoned up under copyright. So hacking the .exe was a copyright violation. The IESDP, a true illegal hacker reference manual. All mods that use or touch existing game resources and change them in any way are violations of WotSC, Atari, Black Isle, BioWare, and now BeamDog/Overhaul as well. Even completely original ones - if they use the source assets, just *putting them into the game* is an unauthorized (get that - un - author - ized = using without permission = stealing) use and a copyright infringement.

While I agree that there isn't a proper mod monetizing here, and that at first glance they seem to be nice guys towards modders, both by acknowledging their work and disclosing new data with the revamped engine, let's not be naive here. "Allowing to keep modding" isn't a selfless act at all, it goes directly into increasing their (potential) benefits, even if they're being nice about it. In fact, I'm pretty sure that without all the mods that've seen the light in the last 14 years, the IE games wouldn't be/remain as "popular" as they are now, and this Beamdog initiative would not have happened in the first place.

@Daulmakan
Do you really think nobody among contributors understands that? Being included into the official release is a good way to advertise self, including the posibility of getting hired by a gaming company, should that be the modder's goal.

If this was a 60 dollar game (or more) I might tend to agree with some of the people saying the game would not be worth it...but if you cannot spend 20 dollars for a video games...? I mean really...most people make that within 1-2 hours of work...I don't see what the big deal is that some people have...If you do not like it...do not buy it!

Also on what GeN1e said...Who the heck would want to romance someone that was fat / ugly / or super old? The majority of people in the world I suspect would much rather he or she be cute / pretty / hot / handsome etc...(Which is why in the fantasy universe unless real life...most of the females you will get in your party / group or whatever I suspect will be young / cute / hot etc...) Because that is what most people would want!

@DaulmakanDo you really think nobody among contributors understands that? Being included into the official release is a good way to advertise self, including the posibility of getting hired by a gaming company, should that be the modder's goal.

I wouldn't know about all of the different contributors' motivations. And while I certainly agree with your point, I don't think it was one that cmorgan made.

If this was a 60 dollar game (or more) I might tend to agree with some of the people saying the game would not be worth it...but if you cannot spend 20 dollars for a video games...? I mean really...most people make that within 1-2 hours of work...I don't see what the big deal is that some people have...If you do not like it...do not buy it!

20 dollars can buy me a large amount of games, especially during Steam Sales :v So buying a game I already own for 20$ is just a waste of money. (Dark Souls costs less than that, and I've sunk ~100 hours into that game)

"People who literally do it 8 hours a day as their job" are doing their job badly and non-professionally. In Russia, at least. Not just games, btw, but books and movies too - I've seen enough examples to call it a tendency.

Man, I thought the Russian jank was a part of the design process.

Well, simply that they refused to sell the game on what would be argubaly be the best site to sell it on (GOG.com)

Or steam. Or even impulse, or OnLive or anything but their horrid turd of a site, who does that anymore?

For my part, I'll simply note that I have no intention of buying BGEE because it offers nothing of interest to me that I don't already have access to.

"The righteous need not cower before the drumbeat of human progress. Though the song of yesterday fades into the challenge of tomorrow, God still watches and judges us. Evil lurks in the datalinks as it lurked in the streets of yesterday, but it was never the streets that were evil." - Sister Miriam Godwinson, Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri

Also on what GeN1e said...Who the heck would want to romance someone that was fat / ugly / or super old? The majority of people in the world I suspect would much rather he or she be cute / pretty / hot / handsome etc...(Which is why in the fantasy universe unless real life...most of the females you will get in your party / group or whatever I suspect will be young / cute / hot etc...) Because that is what most people would want!

What's with the dichotomies? I didn't say I'd prefer old and ugly romantic options. Just because you're not some unscarred flower doesn't mean you're hideous, and looking older than 18 doesn't mean you're a crone. I personally wouldn't consider Jaheira super attractive and super young, but she's got a pretty viable romance, even if being a fighter means she's probably got some nasty scars. So the assumption that a romanceable female has to be elvish and a mage because nothing else is good enough -- never mind that armourless mages can get pretty knocked around also -- is kind of silly. (Yes, Jaheira's a half-elf, but that was probably for multi-classing purposes rather than because it means she's hotter. Also, Harpers and half-elves go together.)

Neera's portrait was drawn based on the picture of a friend of one of Beamdog's employees, so that face belongs to a real-world person. I don't recall anyone complaining about that when it was done for BG1. Just for your information.

What's with the dichotomies? I didn't say I'd prefer old and ugly romantic options. Just because you're not some unscarred flower doesn't mean you're hideous, and looking older than 18 doesn't mean you're a crone. I personally wouldn't consider Jaheira super attractive and super young, but she's got a pretty viable romance, even if being a fighter means she's probably got some nasty scars. So the assumption that a romanceable female has to be elvish and a mage because nothing else is good enough -- never mind that armourless mages can get pretty knocked around also -- is kind of silly. (Yes, Jaheira's a half-elf, but that was probably for multi-classing purposes rather than because it means she's hotter. Also, Harpers and half-elves go together.)

You're implying that only I think Elfs or Mages can be "attractive or viable romance options" Which I never said or implied...All I said is that most people would want them to be cute / pretty / hot /youngish etc...Personally, I find Jaheria quite attractive and not just because she is half an Elf. Also, the scars would not bother me either on her or anyone else most likely.

When I said "Old" I meant like 50 + (in human years at least) I am talking Keldorn age like here...

What's with the dichotomies? I didn't say I'd prefer old and ugly romantic options. Just because you're not some unscarred flower doesn't mean you're hideous, and looking older than 18 doesn't mean you're a crone. I personally wouldn't consider Jaheira super attractive and super young, but she's got a pretty viable romance, even if being a fighter means she's probably got some nasty scars. So the assumption that a romanceable female has to be elvish and a mage because nothing else is good enough -- never mind that armourless mages can get pretty knocked around also -- is kind of silly. (Yes, Jaheira's a half-elf, but that was probably for multi-classing purposes rather than because it means she's hotter. Also, Harpers and half-elves go together.)

You're implying that only I think Elfs or Mages can be "attractive or viable romance options" Which I never said or implied...All I said is that most people would want them to be cute / pretty / hot /youngish etc...Personally, I find Jaheria quite attractive and not just because she is half an Elf. Also, the scars would not bother me either on her or anyone else most likely.

When I said "Old" I meant like 50 + (in human years at least) I am talking Keldorn age like here...

When it comes to what anyone finds attractive I think saying "most people" is never a good idea.

They could have shaken things up a bit and had a romanceable female orc for once. Even a full fighter class female of any race would have been a nice change.

Neera's portrait was drawn based on the picture of a friend of one of Beamdog's employees, so that face belongs to a real-world person. I don't recall anyone complaining about that when it was done for BG1. Just for your information.

Maybe it's just me but I find the idea that they based the portrait on a woman they know somewhat creepy.

"I'm just here to get the job done, let someone else be on the poster." Female Commander Shepard